LogFAQs > #951043915

Nellie and Arthur and Mell and White-Haired Girl [WHG] attend Romeo and Juliet at the 'commoner theatre'. You know, as much as Mell makes me concerned, at least he's not an outright controlling, abusive, annoying person like Arthur. Goodness. With lines like "I'll call you Lady when you start acting like it" and "you could at least try to like me because you're not getting out of this marriage of convenience" [paraphased], who needs enemies?
Nellie makes a break for it once she sees Mell and ends up just misdirecting all her unhappiness on the presence of WHG. This conversation escalates, and Mell slaps her! I'm disappointed in him. She's kinda in la-la-land, but hitting her is not going to make anything better for her. Nellie ends up running away from the theatre and catching a ride back home.

Nellie throws a fit in her room, breaking and throwing everything in sight. The painting of herself and Mell falls off the wall, the frame breaking. She starts scratching at it because the children in the painting look so happy, and it's all a lie! She uncovers a creepy message from 16 years ago about a son and an as-yet-unborn daughter, but it couldn't be referring to Nellie, since she's only 14! Yeesh.

WHG comes back and changes out of her fancy outfit. She speaks to Nellie, who immediately quizzes WHG on her father's hair color. WHG responds that her father's hair color was white. Then Nellie cackles, saying she's figured it all out. We hear an unsettling sound of blades - scissors?

Oh no. So Nellie, wearing a wig of WHG's hair, sneaks into Mell's bedchamber and kisses him. He doesn't realize it's his sister at first, but once he does, he pushes her away and calls her a madwoman. Apparently, she's always felt this way. No telling what she did with WHG, but she said she sent her away because she doesn't fit with this household. Nellie says that Mell must only love blood-related women.

So, here's the story as told by Nellie - the painter with white hair, WHG's father, lay with Mell's mother and the resulting daughter was WHG. Since the baby had white hair, it had to be sent away with the painter. A couple years later, Nellie was born, having flaxen hair that was more in line with what was expected from the Rhodes bloodline. Their mother had been so 'kind' by taking in WHG as a servant a few nights ago not because of an innate sense of graciousness, but because she likely recognized her illegitimate daughter.
The 'Dearest Mell' part is reading quite a bit like a suicide note...

Mell runs off in the rain, searching for something, anything, to tell him this is all a lie. That he didn't fall for his half-sister. That his little sister doesn't love him in that way. He bangs on the door of the church, searching for answers from the priest. The beggar who came by and often received coins from Mell begs from him once more in the rain, and Mell pushes him away, finally acting like a rich brat under pressure.

Except it is WHG, head shorn, who's rejected by Mell just now. She runs away, he catches up with her. He begs her to come back with him, he promises that Nellie will be married off soon, he promises that none of it matters and that her hair will grow back. WHG doesn't seem to know the whole story, and runs away instead of taking Mell's hand. Mell sobs and the Maid speaks to him. He wanted to be treated kindly, and so he treated others with kindness. Was the loss of all the happiness of everyone he loved a just repayment for his deeds? At some point, we must outgrow our childhoods. As I've wondered recently - is it only to be sad repeatedly, for the rest of our days?

We return to the present time with the Maid. This still hasn't jogged our memory, so the Maid's concerned, but she has other plans. I have to say, the Maid's sprite has very sunken eyes that are only obvious when she closes her eyes and smiles. It reminds me of...Rosalia Lombardo, a 2 year old who died in 1920 and was near-perfectly preserved. Anyway, this gives the Maid a deathly feeling.

You ask her for her name, and she refuses to give it. You are welcome to call her 'the Maid' until you regain your memory - it is then, she says, that she will welcome hearing her own name again.

You both pass a mirror and neither of you show a reflection in it. Hmmm...

---

Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself...: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize?
-Marcus Aurelius